God’s not finished with Scotland

Lynne McNeil meets the Moderator-Designate, the Rev Dr Martin Fair, amid the cancellation of this year’s General Assembly for the first time in over 300 years.

IT WILL be a very different ceremony to install the Moderator-Designate of the Church of Scotland in 2020.

This year’s General Assembly has been cancelled in light of the Coronavirus Covid-19 pandemic (see page 29) meaning that the installation of the Rev Dr Martin Fair in the Church’s ambassadorial role will be dramatically different. The Assembly is the first to be cancelled since 1689, such is the gravity of the biggest public health crisis in a century.

A low-key Commission of Assembly has instead been planned.

But Dr Fair, minister at Arbroath: St Andrew’s, whilst naturally disappointed, is philosophical about the cancellation of the centrepiece of the central Church’s year.

“Since 1689, look at what the world has been through and there has always been a General Assembly and here we are now with the Coronavirus Covid-19 pandemic and there is no General Assembly. That is a measure of how serious this is.

“You have got to acknowledge that people are dying out there and the world, economically, is dealing with intense pressure and the National Health Service is going to be stretched to the limit. Whether the General Assembly takes place is a small matter really compared to all of that and it was absolutely the right decision to cancel.”

He believes the Church will become more creative as a result of enforced change stemming from the pandemic. Dr Fair has already been holding online meetings and believes it can transform the way it conducts business. At the time of writing all public worship has been cancelled until further notice and the Church offices in Edinburgh are closed (see page 43).

But as a result of the pandemic, Martin’s first few months will not be the typical time of a newly installed Moderator, but will be spent back in his parish in Arbroath, rather than in the Moderator’s residence in Edinburgh. In the wake of the shutdown and faced with an empty diary until the crisis subsides, he has returned to Angus and made the return journey by rail, in keeping with a pledge during his year in office to use public transport wherever possible.

As you travel by bus or train around Scotland over the next year, don’t be surprised if you find Martin sitting beside you.

Whilst Moderators in recent times have travelled whenever possible by public transport, he is the first to challenge congregations to help fulfil his promise.

“In my moderatorial year I am going to go by public transport as much as I can.

“Even in this preparation period I am using public transport. It would be easier and more convenient for me to use the car but I am going to travel by train and bus as much as I can and I am going to follow that through the year. It is going to require something of the places I am going to visit.

“I’m doing it because I think it is important. Our youth delegates and others have been so forcefully persuasive to the General Assembly in recent years. This year I had the opportunity to have a car for my convenience but it would be a serious mistake not to take public transport.”

It will present inconvenient challenges for Martin, but he is committed to making a difference, wherever possible, during his year. He had planned to personally carbon offset trips overseas but the picture at the time of writing on these visits is uncertain. Trips had been planned to support distinct minority Christians – particularly in Lebanon and Syria – but the shadow of Covid-19 means the programme is uncertain for now.

The inconvenience of public transport will be multiplied after an accident in 2017 left him with limited movement in his left arm.

“It was a huge life lesson for me suffering this accident and how it has left me with the left arm semi functioning. Before that happened I would have considered myself to be self sufficient. I did not need anyone’s help. To go from that to needing help, washing, eating and everything you can imagine by way of daily functioning was a life lesson.

“I wish it had not happened, but good has come out of a bad thing. It has taught me a whole lot. It gives one a new perspective in life. It helps me to better understand those who have to live with that all their days. My injury is minor compared to a lot of people. It has just helped me to see better what it is. “Although it is problematic there are so many people with much harder situations.”

Born in Johnstone, Renfrewshire, Martin was one of two sons born into a churchgoing family (his dad Bill was an elder and his mum, Ena, a stalwart of the local church) in Thornliebank on the south side of Glasgow. His wife, Elaine, was born in the same month and the couple lived in the same street and grew up together at Thornliebank Primary School and Woodfarm Secondary School, church and university, before marrying in 1987. Martin credits his local church with sowing the seeds of faith that ultimately led to his call to parish ministry.

The Rev Dr Martin Fair

I think as I have ministered probably what people have said to me most is that I am an encourager and an inspirer and that is what I hope to do in this coming year. 

“What was significant was a new minister, the Rev Ian Purves came when we were aged about 12 or 13, replacing an old traditional Highland minister. Here was a new younger minister who came along and created a youth group. There was about a dozen to 15 of us in that youth group at the beginning and many more who were involved along the way. Fourteen of us still meet up and of that group four became ordained ministers of the Church of Scotland and there were at least five marriages. (Two of the group, the Rev Catherine Beattie minister at Giffnock South and the Rev Gregor McIntyre, minister at Clydebank: Faifley will serve as his chaplains during the year).

“It was a formative time in our lives. The minister took us on summer mission. We went to Girvan for that year’s summer mission. It was absolutely fundamental in sensing some call to ministry.”

The minister led the Youth Fellowship which took a couple of services with the congregation each year.

“I got asked to preach when I was about 17. I think it went reasonably well. The minister said: ‘you need to definitely think about having ministry in your life’.” I was set to do a politics degree at Strathclyde University. I was not really thinking about a career in the Church, but it was Glasgow in the mid-1980s and it was recessionary times. I was going to be a social worker or completely unrealistically I thought I was going to be the head of housing at the then Glasgow District Council, or something like that. I was going to be involved in real life.

“The only job I eventually got was in Leeds but with the Church of England as a youth worker. This immersed me in the daily life working with the Church of England. It was during that time that the prayers, thoughts and possibilities coalesced. I decided I would go into the ministry.”

He applied to the Church’s selection school and was admitted on his first try at the age of 21. Divinity studies followed at Glasgow University: “Elaine was working as a primary teacher so it made sense for me to study in Glasgow.”

He was licensed by the Presbytery of Glasgow in Glasgow Cathedral (among a group of 17) in July 1989 and completed his probation at Christ Church in Bermuda.

“We found a church that was absolutely thriving and we built the youth group up to way over 100 kids. They were just a good church doing really good ministry. It inspired us for coming home. If it can be done there, it can be done here. It was inspirational to us.

“We made lifelong friends in Bermuda and we’ve returned there, most recently last year for the 300th anniversary of the church.”

As probation drew to a close, Martin spent time scanning letters about vacancies from the central Church and the pages of Life and Work.“Because I had been out of the loop it was agreed that I would do six months’ reacclimatisation in Scotland. There were letters going back and forward and I was saying to send me to any church in Glasgow. Word came back that it would be Dundee: St Mary’s. I wrote back checking my letters had not gone astray and again the letter came back that it would be Dundee: St Mary’s. It turned out the late Very Rev Dr Bill Macmillan was Moderator that year. A locum was looking after things and I would be serving with him. I still think that was absolutely providential. “The vacancy came up in Arbroath: St Andrews. If we had been living in Glasgow there was no way I would have ever thought about it. I thought I was going to minister in Glasgow. We found ourselves in Dundee and looking at the list, Arbroath was close by – only 15 miles away.

“I remember going to look – it was a dreich, wet autumnal day and we drove through to Arbroath and St Andrew’s. There was nothing to commend it and draw us to it. We could have run a mile but something genuinely stirred within us.

“The next day Elaine and a friend came through on a Sunday morning and went to the Church. Elaine came home and said it was great, so welcoming and definitely worth checking out. The rest is history.”

Martin applied and was called to the charge on January 28 1992 and Martin and Elaine (followed by three sons Callum, Andrew and Fraser) have been there ever since. Having been born near the birthplace of William Wallace, Martin says he found himself in a church across the road from Arbroath Abbey, where Robert the Bruce signed the Declaration of Independence 700 years ago on April 6 2020.

Martin sees his appointment as part of the town’s ‘big year’ and describes it as ‘an honour for the town’.

Arbroath will also be woven into his Moderatorial outfit – a frock coat.

“I have a friend who has designed a special tartan to mark the 700th anniversary of the Declaration of Arbroath and every thread means something.

“I will have touches of tartan added to the cuffs. It will give me a talking point. Every single thread in that tartan means something.”

In nearly 30 years in Arbroath, he believes his ministry has involved three separate jobs.

“The first was me doing it all because that is how it was. There is a minister, a congregation, youth group, visiting. That was the norm at that time. After a certain number of years it became clear to me that I was going to be a bottle neck.

“We genuinely needed to sort out development and the next phase of ministry was about the people of God. We began to take it seriously, identifying gifts, skills, experiences and freeing the congregation up to say they could have roles to play in the church and the outreach. “That was an absolutely key time. “My main focus in that period was raising other people up to do that ministry. I was doing less of the jobs, but was freed to learn and was just encouraging, equipping and enabling. It was so rewarding with people finding themselves and growing in confidence in their own lives. “We built the Church up. “The third phase came at St Andrew’s Church when we were asking the question: ‘We have built up a strong church so what do we do so we can begin to impact the community at large?’ That has been the third phase. It has involved Havilah and

things that are genuinely making a difference in the town. We could not have got there without the stages in between. We had to raise up a whole army of people who are ready to serve in the wider community.

“We multiplied opportunities for people to get involved and it was not just what we did on a Sunday morning or the Monday to Friday rest of church.

“The power of it is not about church organisations as such, important as they are, a lot of what we do is about actually just trying to make a difference in the community. Meeting needs where they are greatest. There is a big emphasis on mental health.”

Mental health will be one of the key themes of Martin’s year, an interest that would have resonated with the Lord High Commissioner to this year’s Assembly, the Earl of Strathearn.

“Our mental health services are in such a place that the voluntary sector, not least, the Church steps up.”

He is passionate about underfunding of services in a much needed area of healthcare. As an example of the pressures facing those in need and health care staff he talks of a young man he worked with who had tried to take his life three times in a short period but was told he would need to wait 18 weeks for a referral at a time of crisis. St Andrew’s with support from grant funding, set up the Havilah Project and three related projects, principally helping addicts and those with mental health issues.

Foodbanks are another area where the congregation was ahead of the curve.

Such concerns have been reflected by the congregation which he says identified a need for a food bank ‘long before anyone heard about it’.

Another parish concern he will endeavour to reflect during the year is care and concern for Christians living as minorities, with visits to Lebanon and Syria and Nepal pencilled in. A prayer group meets every month at St Andrew’s to pray for those who suffer for their faith.

Presbytery visits are also planned to Perth, West Lothian and Abernethy.

As someone who has steered his own church through change, Martin recognises the value of the Church at a time of uncertainty and change not just in the Church of Scotland but in wider society.

“I think the Church is a steady influence in testing times and yet, in the Gospel, we have within our hands that which can change lives and transform societies.

“To me we are at least three generations away from when the Church was still influential. Within society, if we are ever going to win back a degree of credibility or the right to speak of what we believe we have got to be proving the truth of what we believe by our service.

“At this point in time the Church is on its knees, not in a negative sense, but in a serving sense and in a praying sense. Our fundamental provision should be that all the things that the Church does to serve people.”

An early adopter of webcasting services, he believes they have had an impact on people.

“We get regular messages from people around Scotland and around the world. We have a senior elder who watches every week who is no longer able to come to church. “It’s so that young people are away working shifts or offshore can still be part of church. There are some who say webcasting may lead folks away from the church, tempting them just to stay in bed on Sunday mornings! There may be one or two who do that but what happens if you are getting another 49 or 50? Since the enforced closure of churches in mid-March, lots of churches have been putting out digital versions of Sunday worship and many are repoting significantly more ‘views’ than ordinarily they have in their churches week by week.

“As we are struggling for ministers, certainly in the more rural areas of the country the streaming of services may become an option.

“His work was boosted by a doctorate at Princeton in the early millennium which he has deployed in his ministry.

“When I did my BD it was all theory, reading this stuff but with little experience to apply. Going back and studying with eight to ten years of ordained ministry behind me – it was a completely different experience. The doctorate was crucial.”

He has served the central church as Convener of the Parish Development Fund and as Vice Convener of the former Mission and Discipleship Council, as well as at presbytery level.

“I honestly still feel as enthusiastic and encouraged and just up for it from the day I started. I have said through the years if I thought the Church was dead then I would have quit and done something more useful with my life.

“I am absolutely convinced that God’s not finished with Scotland.

“The Church we are going to see in the days to come may not be recognisable from what we know but it will be there.”

In his absence away from the parish, a range of people will help out and on two Sundays, the congregation will look after worship themselves.

At a time of change for the Church, he hopes to spend the year offering encouragement.

“I think as I have ministered probably what people have said to me most is that I am an encourager and an inspirer and that is what I hope to do in this coming year. “I think that Church is at an inbetween time. I hope I can be someone who will enthuse and encourage all as a church to remain faithful and to believe that God has a future for us and that we continue journeying towards that.”

This article appears in the May 2020 Issue of Life and Work

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